The invention relates to delivery vehicles. More specifically, the invention relates to delivery vehicles that deliver frozen, refrigerated and room temperature goods.
Historically, before the advent of supermarkets, butchers, milk men, bakers, fishmongers, ice men, and other food and goods vendors maintained separate stores. Traditionally, these purveyors delivered foods and goods to customers, typically at home, with a vehicle that suited their sole kind of food or goods. That is, the ice man delivered with a specialized vehicle for delivering frozen foods; the butcher delivered with a specialized refrigerated vehicle, etc. Supermarkets stock a plethora of foods and good, as intimated by the name itself. Supermarkets stock frozen foods, refrigerated foods, and room temperature foods and goods. In most places, supermarkets do not deliver, and/or patrons shop in the supermarket and transport purchases themselves. Therefore, until now, there has been no demand for a multi-compartment multi-climate delivery vehicle.
The increasing popularity of the Internet threatens to alter societal buying habits to an extent potentially even greater than the introduction of the supermarket. The Internet provides a virtual storefront through which shoppers of all kinds of foods and goods may place orders for delivery. A virtual supermarket that stocks room temperature goods and food, frozen foods, and refrigerated foods may be required to deliver foods and goods that must maintain their appropriate temperature during transport. A multi-compartment multi-climate delivery vehicle is needed to accommodate these deliveries.
Deliveries are made to supermarkets and other large entities by tractor-trailer rigs and other kinds of large delivery trucks. These trucks typically have single temperature storage for delivering one type of good, not unlike the purveyors of old. An example of such a truck is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,161,848. Some delivery trucks suited for making deliveries to supermarkets and other large entities have been developed to provide for multiple climates required by various foods and goods. However, such large delivery trucks are not suitable for delivery to homes and smaller businesses because of their size. Further, use of such large vehicles for home delivery is not practical because an inordinately large number of personal deliveries would have to be included to fill such large vehicles.
In addition, the systems taught by prior art multi-compartment multi-climate trailers cannot be effectively or efficiently deployed for use in home delivery vehicles. For example, the vehicle in U.S. Pat. No. 5,054,295 includes use of air conducting channels, heaters, and other features situated in the body of a trailer portion of a tractor trailer rig that are beyond the scope and kind of system useful a for home delivery vehicle. The extent of the heating and air cooling devices taught therein significantly detract from the amount of cargo space available if applied in a smaller vehicle for use in home delivery. Similarly, the system taught in U.S. Pat. No. 5,704,676 includes two separate air cooling units, one for a refrigerated compartment and a second for a freezer compartment. Again, the extent of the system significantly detracts from the amount of cargo space available if deployed in a home delivery vehicle. The prior art does not teach an effective system and method for a multi-compartment multi-climate delivery vehicle of the size and type needed to accommodate deliveries to homes and small businesses of the type disclosed herein.
A delivery vehicle having a room temperature compartment, a freezer compartment and a refrigerated compartment. The refrigerated compartment is adjacent to the freezer compartment. The refrigerated compartment has a shared wall with the freezer compartment, and the shared wall has a fan assembly that moves air from the freezer compartment to the refrigerated compartment. A control unit allows the driver to monitor and control the temperature in the freezer compartment and the refrigerated compartment from the driver area. A room temperature compartment may share air with the driver area.